Tag: England

In 1809 Elizabeth Matthews shares many a childhood adventure with her soul-mate, Thomas Lamb, son of the estate’s handyman.
Elizabeth is entrusted with the safe keeping of a tin box by her Mama but instead, leaves the task to Thomas’s father Joseph. However, life in the windswept north-east coastal village of Alunby is left behind when she is promptly sent away to be schooled in the city of York.
Risking her reputation, and a possible marriage match, Elizabeth dreams of the day when the secret inside the tin box will be revealed to her, and goes on a journey of rediscovery to find Thomas and seek out the stolen treasure.
Some secrets were intended to stay buried, however, what Elizabeth discovers is of greater value than she could ever have imagined.

Ellie has recurring nightmares of a child surrounded by early nineteenth century luxury who is kidnapped. When Ellie wakes it is to the normal sparse surroundings of her attic room and a life devoid of love. Yet, haunted by the child’s fear, she still dares to dream that one day she will be happy and find love.

Living in the old hall with her Aunt Gertrude and cousins Cybil and Jane, she feels as if she neither belongs to the family nor the ranks of the few servants. Her aunt frequently reminds Ellie that she is the child of shame – her mother had eloped with a Frenchman. The scandal, apparently, cast a long shadow over Ellie and the family.

However, when Aunt Gertrude announces that a suitor has been found for her Ellie’s initial excitement quickly turns to dread and humiliation.

Mr William Cookson’s unwelcome presence shines a light onto her past, but how can Ellie escape from her aunt’s plan for her future?

The term ‘Luddite’ is widely used even today, but its origins are shrouded in both truth and myth.

Two names that are supposed to have been associated with it are Ned Ludd and King Llud. Whatever the truth, the term has stayed in common language. Today it is used to describe someone who is averse to technical change, but its origins stemmed from men who thought they were fighting to save their livelihoods and their families from being destitute.

Since medieval times the wool trade had been of great importance to the working people of our nation. Traditionally women and their children spun the yarn and the menfolk were skilled loom weavers. Each piece of cloth was then taken to market to be sold in the Piece Halls. In the early nineteenth century new inventions took over this traditional family method of making and selling cloth.

With new cotton and wool mills growing in size and numbers, the workers that left their villages to work in them need not be so skilled. They could be taught a task and become part of the overall process.

The volume of cloth produced could therefore be increased. Uniformity and scale of production would be guaranteed by the use of these wider weaving machines. But the downside was that the employment was no longer a cottage industry, but required a central approach, breaking up communities and leaving men without the means to feed their families. With the price of food, particularly bread increasing, the men felt somehow their concerns needed to be heard.

The actions of a man allegedly called Edward Ludlam also knonw as ‘Ned Ludd’ in 1779 was given the label ‘Luddite’. He was accused of breaking two frames in anger. So when in Nottingham in 1811 groups of weavers gathered and planned attacks on targeted mills to destroy the machines that had taken away their livelihood, the term ‘Luddite’ was used again and stuck.

These attacks spread to Yorkshire and other counties and continued for a number of years. Groups banded in numbers of up to three figures, but surprisingly few were actually caught or hanged. Some were transported, perhaps unjustly, as those who were accused of being part of a gathering or an attack would have little defence heard to save them. King Llud was used on letters of demand to add weight to their threats and demands.

In 1812 The Frame Breaking Act made the breaking of stocking-frames a capital felony, hence allowing the death penalty to be given to those caught. Rewards were offered, but the local people were the very families of the men who were trying to stop a revolution of machine replacing manual labour, soit was unlikely that many would provide information. It is also likely they would be in danger if they were discovered by the gang members. It was a battle they could never win,

The government and the mill owners did not listen to their pleas. Workers, including young children, were paid low, had no say over their conditions and were often exploited.This was exactly the situation Phoebe and Thomas escaped from in Phoebe’s Challenge. As mills developed not all owners were as harsh (they were by comparison to today’s working practices) but some introduced education, shorter hours for children and healthier diet and living conditions. This is where the idea for Laura’s Legacy came from.

Just click on the link to see how Phoebe rises to the challenge or how Laura’s Legacy survives!

In November 2015 I interviewed Sally Bridgewater, Creative Writing Courses & Competitions Coordinator for Writing Magazine, who was about to embark on an extreme writing challenge of hitting the 50,000 word target for the NaNoWriMo Challenge – but in one day!

I thought I’d catch up with Sally and see what has happened since.

Hi, Sally, welcome back. Can you share with us what has happened as a result of completing the challenge?

Doing the twenty-four hour wordathon was a fun challenge, but I wouldn’t class it as life-changing. I did really appreciate getting the chance to write a piece about it in the Writing Magazine, which is my first proper published article. It did really help me get the rest of my novel draft done back in November 2015, and getting a full draft down on paper gave me a lot more confidence that I really will finish this novel one day.

Have you submitted the finished draft yet?

Nowhere near! I took a break after NaNoWriMo in 2015 – one of the downsides of taking on extreme challenges is that afterwards you usually feel in need of an extreme rest. So I only picked my novel back up in April 2016, when I started world-building and generally trying to re-plot the whole thing. I just aimed for twice a week as I’ve been pretty busy with other things, and that gave me a good stretch of steady progress on it over the summer.

Believe it or not, I have not yet gone back and re-read what I wrote in the wordathon or in the rest of that November – as soon as I started working on the novel again I knew I’d be changing so much that there wasn’t too much point in working from the draft outwards. I still don’t see it as a waste of time though – doing that really rough draft gave me a rough sense of the characters, the world, the plot, and most especially got me far enough to imagine what would happen at the end. All of that was crucial, and as I am a first-time novelist I don’t think there was any other way for me to work out a full plot from my first ideas. I’m hoping with my second or third book I won’t have to write completely discarded drafts though!

I hope not. However, I can see how completing this punishing challenge has taught you so much and given you a tangible first draft to build upon.

In November 2016 I wanted to do NaNoWriMo again, of course, and I was aiming for a complete rewrite of the novel with my new plot. Even though I was the most prepared I’ve ever been, with a spreadsheet of all the scenes I was planning, unfortunately life got in the way. I finally reached the top of the waiting list for a much-delayed jaw surgery during November so I had to give that priority. I thought lying on the sofa recovering would give me lots of time to write, but it turns out that healing is a lot more tiring than it looks! I didn’t want to push myself while I was obviously not at full health, so I’ve not given myself a hard time about it.

I hope you are fully recovered now. What are your writing goals for 2017?

Get this second draft finished! I have recommitted to writing 1000 words a day, and it’s really working pretty well at the moment. I use the Jotterpad app on my phone to write on the bus on my way to and from work, and I am genuinely surprised how much easier I find it to do that than to carve out a chunk of time to sit at my computer – somehow that just feels more like Hard Work. I am using all the psychology tricks I can to make it easier, such as congratulating myself just for making the three short taps it takes to open the Jotterpad on my phone. I know that’s all I have to do really, and then once it’s actually in front of me it’s much easier to contemplate doing the actual writing.

I am also using a site called Beeminder.com to keep me on track – it makes a graph of a goal you want to achieve, so in my case I have one tracking the number of ‘days I worked on my main fiction project’ and I’ve set my target as only three days a week. This is because if you fall off the line on the graph of how many things you said you’d do, then Beeminder charges your credit card an ever-increasing amount of money. It is scarily effective at keeping you motivated, I’d seriously recommend it for anything you’re stuck on.

I’ve then got a great writing project I’m looking forward to in April – my friend Tonks and I (who helped with the Wordathon in the first place) have agreed to do ‘Camp NaNoWriMo’ and make it Editing Month. The real twist is that I will edit her first draft and she will edit mine. It’s a little scary but we trust each other and it will be so much easier seeing how to improve someone else’s work rather than your own. So that gives me a deadline to get the second draft done!

Between the famous resort of Scarborough and the ancient port of Whitby lies the little known village of Ravenscar, formerly named Peak. Today this slightly remote headland location is home to a cluster of houses, the National Trust Coastal Centre and the impressive Raven Hall, built C1774, which has fine views over the sea and across the bay to Robin Hood’s Bay.

The Hall became the Raven Hall Hotel in 1895 and now also has a frequently windswept golf course. The impressive castellated hanging gardens even have a sheltered cubby hole in the rock, which could be used to shelter from the storms and north easterlies, or even possibly to have been used to signal out to sea.

The existence of Ravenscar is owed to The Peak Estate Company who wanted to create a holiday resort to rival its successful near neighbours. Their ambition was great. The railway line brought prospectors to this healthy resort between moor and sea. Streets named after previous invaders were planned: Roman, Angle, Saxon and Dane.

The main drawback, other than its exposed position, was that the fine sandy beaches, which can be found at Scarborough or north of Whitby, did not exist here. It is situated on a headland with a cliff face over 600 feet high. The way down to the sea level is precarious and the shore rocky. Although you can sometimes see seals, it was hardly going to attract the traveller who wanted to enjoy seaside walks or dips. Drains and water supply were installed, but of the 1200+ plots there were insufficient buyers to make the town viable and so the company ceased in 1913.

Now, the area is a real draw for walkers, ornithologists, painters, and nature lovers. You can explore the deserted workings of the alum works. It is this history that brought me to this beautiful yet wild spot. When researching for ‘To Love, Honour and Obey’ and the region for Abigail Moor I looked into the history of the Yorkshire alum industry and discovered the Peak site. Admittedly my fictional workings were north of Whitby, but the importance of the industry and the links to London was based on facts.

Today if you visit the National Trust Visitor Centre you can follow a looped path (2.2 km/1.35 miles) that takes you to a viewpoint across the bay, across the golf course past the fresh water pond, skirting the bluebell wood down to the alum works. Once you’ve circled the remains, double back up the other side of the bluebell woods to the brick works and back along by the railway cutting to the coastal centre.

You can join the Cleveland Way from here, and in spring the bluebells are beautiful.

The inclines make the walk slightly more challenging, along with the strong winds that were cutting inland from the sea on the day I visited. It is a wild setting, but well worth a visit for the views alone.

Phoebe and her brother, Thomas, have to flee the evil regime of Benjamin Bladderwell when an accident results in them being labelled machine breakers. Hunted with nowhere to run, the mysterious Matthew saves their lives.He is a man of many guises who Phoebe instinctively trusts, but Thomas does not. Their future depends upon this stranger, unaware that he is also tied to their past.

It is 1820: Miss Laura Pennington is the wilful daughter of self-made man, Obadiah Pennington. Having risen from being a humble fisherman’s daughter she is still adjusting to her new position in society. Caught trespassing on private land, fate crosses her path in the person of Mr Daniel Tranton. Together they come to the aid of a mill runaway. Neither realise that the men hunting him are also set on hurting Daniel until his future depends on Laura’s quick thinking and action.